


Follow Me Home

by Dark_Ruby_Regalia



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Cor chops wood, Couch Sex, First person POV (Nyx), M/M, Niflheim won, Now there's the Other Jam too, Nyx is beautiful, Then there's the Other Wood, War is over
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-19
Updated: 2019-02-21
Packaged: 2019-10-31 11:00:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,344
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17848223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dark_Ruby_Regalia/pseuds/Dark_Ruby_Regalia
Summary: Nyx lives alone in a cabin in the woods, very much in the middle of nowhere.Cor is lost, tired, and needs a place to sleep.Nyx offers him a warm meal and a place on his couch for the night...And one night turns to two, to three, to four... maybe more...





	1. Sleep on the floor

**Author's Note:**

  * For [miriya](https://archiveofourown.org/users/miriya/gifts).



His was a car one thousand miles too far from the city it came from, and it showed. The sheen of the paint; the sparkle. The tyres made for paved roads; the gas tank made for trips too short to watch your needle fall by the minute. But here it was, pulling into the lookout at the crest of the ridge, obscene in its luxury, the golden blaze of sunset wrapped across the windshield. I didn’t get to see his face until he stepped out, threw half a second appraisal my way, then shook out his legs while he walked to the faded map on an old sightseeing board.

Nobody came this way any more. The map was out of date by at least a decade. I wondered how much of my value he’d caught in that half second; whether I was about to waste my time.

“You lost?” I asked, and slid off the bonnet of my sweet old thing - no sheen, no sparkle… no paint at all in some places. He twisted at the hip to give another few seconds my way. Eyes a crisp and glacial blue. They did a quick flick up and down. I smiled. Maybe it helped turn him around properly.

“Yes and no,” was all he said for now, and he took a few long strides to the railing that separated us from the drop on the other side. “There wasn’t a destination.”

I took a chance on understanding. “Can’t get lost if we don’t know where we’re going?” It seemed to work. Maybe he almost smiled, but I’d a feeling smiles were a pretty rare grace to his face.

“Anywhere to sleep nearby?”

There wasn’t. Not for triple digit miles in any direction. I shook my head so he’d know as much. He dragged a hand down his face, pausing thumb and forefinger across eyelids. He was weary. Far from home. Now, I bet, he felt more lost than not. Probably hungry. Cellphone dead. I knew how bad what I was about to say would sound, but there was no avoiding it, so… “I’ve a cabin and a couch and a fresh loaf of bread. You’re welcome to them for a night if you need it.”

His eyes were fierce. Unblinking. I could feel him sizing me up as a danger; a thought he quickly dismissed.

“How far?”

“Close. Just… it’s a cabin in the woods, and I know this is how all the scary movies start, but I swear I just like the peace and quiet. I’m Nyx,” and I held my hand out, and hoped he’d take it. He did.

“Cor.” That was all there was. Or all I got, I guess.

~

I’ve done it a few times along this stretch - had a car follow for a while to get back to a main artery - but never had one follow all the way to my front door. Especially not a car like _this_ , with the extra glitz around the headlights. He kept a safe distance, probably as much for the gravel thrown up by my tyres as for the courtesy of it. We’d left the pavement a while back, and this track wasn’t much of one. You take it slow, let the steering have its way. No point fighting the movement of gravel beneath tyres. We parked where the track ran out. In the late dusk, it looked the middle of nowhere. I guess it was.

“It’s just ahead, though you can’t see it. I’ve got a flashlight.” I clicked the thing on and directed the beam, and up a ways, between the trees, the corner of my cabin caught the light. “Anything you’d like a hand bringing in for the night?”

“I don’t have anything.”

It looked that way. He was too well dressed for long trips, but his shirt was creased up at the back. There was stubble on his cheeks. He looked tired. “Shower?” I asked, while we stepped up onto the porch and I opened the door. He took a while to react - to realise there was some small luxury on offer, by rustic cabin standard - but he nodded. Yeah, I can imagine that sounded good. It took a few seconds between flicking the switch and the lights coming on, dim at first, warming up. He closed the door behind us.

Of course this was laundry day, and I’d brought someone home to the sight of my underpants draped over the back of every chair. For maybe two seconds I felt a little embarrassed, and for a few more I started a handful of sentences and didn’t finish any. “Let me just, ah-” and “Missed one here, huh” and “Well the spiracorn ate a pair last week, so I-”

Almost. Almost a smile again. I saw one tempt the corner of his lip. Then I loaded a towel into his arms, and took another chance. “Would you like a clean shirt?”

He was going to say no, but stopped himself. Said thank you instead. The needs outweighed the propriety. I was glad for it. Happy to help. Knew what it was like to be in three-day clothes, without sleep, without relief. Not knowing when that would change. The energy it took to _endure_ , to not look for the bright exit ‘cause it meant you were hoping for it. So I put a folded shirt on top of the towel. One of my older ones, buried a few layers deep in the drawer. I didn’t need it.

“Bathroom’s through here,” and I pushed open the one door in the cabin that didn’t exit outside. A shower that ran over a bathtub; a curtain that clung to your wet body if you turned into it wrong. A basin with exposed pipes below; mirror tacked directly into the wood of the wall. “The pump will come on when you turn the tap; be prepared for a rush of water afterward. Hot water can be a bit variable, but it’s gas, so it won’t run out. The cylinders are pretty full. Take your time.”

I’d almost left him to it, but doubled back just as he was shaking the towel out on the rail. “Should be a new toothbrush in that box on the windowsill. You’ll have to use my paste, though.” Then I closed him in, and wondered whether I should sweep the floor real quick. I don’t know why. Why did I care what some stranger who would soon be my brand of minty-fresh thought of my hospitality? The place wasn’t too bad; there was nothing _in it_ to mess up. Somewhere to sit. Somewhere to eat. Somewhere to sleep. Somewhere to cook.

The water pump rumbled to life just as I pulled the sheets back on the bed. Yeah, checking for stains. I’ll admit it.

~

He came out a modest shower later. Not a long one, not a short one. He’d made sure he was clean, then stayed under the spray a minute or two longer. I hoped it was because he felt comfortable enough to do it; comfortable enough to accept what was offered. So far he had, though I could see hesitation cross his face with each offer. Accepting probably had less to do with wanting to, and more to do with having no choice.

His hair was wet at the nape of his neck; dark against skin that had seen its fair share of sunshine. My shirt hung off his shoulders with a little too much room, though the fabric of it was soft enough - worn out enough - to fall against the form of him. His shoulders were rounded with muscle; his forearms lean and strong. Those ice blue eyes located me in the room, then dropped to the bread I was slicing on a wooden board. It was dense and moist - baked this morning. The one food thing I put some effort into: bread. When it was a meal at least once a day, and the other meals came out of a tin more often than not, a fresh loaf was a treat. And it made the cabin smell good.

Cor, fresh washed by my soap, walked past on the way to the table. He smelled like me.

~

We shared a knife ‘cause I hadn’t done the dishes. He followed my lead with spreads. Butter from the bell and thick apricot jam I’d bought from a roadside stall. It was good and sweet and dripped along the bit edge, feeling much more indulgent than bread and jam ever should.

“How much in your tank?”

“A quarter maybe, but the last half goes faster than the first.”

“What’s your consumption like?”

“It’s-” and he shook his head once to emphasise- “terrible.”

“I don’t think you’re gonna make it to the next station.”

He was too tired to think it through. Too tired to respond. Just bit into his bread.

“We could siphon my tank, but I don’t think I’d make it to the station then. We’ll have to drive out tomorrow to fill a tin. If you follow me until your fuel runs out, there won’t be as far to come back at least.”

“I’m conscious of having made myself your problem.”

“Doesn’t feel like that on my end, but I understand how it would on yours.” I took my plate to the sink. “Hot drink? I’m having one.” He brought his plate over too, stacked it on mine, mumbled a _thank you_ that was also a _yes, please_. Having him close like this, I became aware of how small the place was; how much space a single body took up. Even in his silence, Cor was solid in the room. A palpable weight that bent my attention his way. He was good looking. Taller than me. Much narrower. Older. He stood against his weariness like he was used to the burden, squaring it on his shoulders and wearing it well. A little drawn in the face, slow to respond, but paying fast attention to whatever I was doing.

I caught him looking once or twice; felt good about it. Made up for how easily he’d looked past me on the roadside. Not dismissed, just not relevant to his moment. Now I was. Neither of us shied from the wordless eye contact.

I was waiting for water to boil in a saucepan; took the chance to lean against the counter and watch him drift his gaze around the room. Not a lot to take in, like I said. I wondered whether he’d put much mind to the solitary bed. It was big enough for two, but pressed into the back corner. _Don’t worry, Cor,_  I thought to myself. _You won’t have to climb over me to get your sleep._ As much as the thought had its appeal. He caught me smiling about it, but would never know why.

~

I planned this next part and he never saw it coming: me, drinking hot chocolate on the sunken cushions of the couch; him at the table again, gazing into his cup, drinking slower than sleep was taking over. I took my last mouthful, clunked the mug to the unpolished floorboards out of the way, then did my best to lay down. It would do for one night.

“You can flick the light out on your way to the bed. Switch by the door.”

“I won’t take your bed, Nyx.” Ah, my name finally found its way through his lips.

“Too late, I’m already asleep.” I closed my eyes tight. It was childish, but also a little bit funny, I hoped, and close enough to the truth. He didn’t say anything more. After a minute I heard his chair scrape back and him step barefoot into the kitchen with his mug. Then he disappeared into the bathroom - there's no way not to hear a man pee in a space this small - washed his hands before reemerging. Hit the light switch on his way to the bed, shucking his pants somewhere between. A slow shuffle in the dark ‘cause he didn’t know this place by feel. He sat on the edge of the mattress a few minutes more, as though there was chivalry in resistance. Took my shirt off. Then finally, finally he lay back against my pillows, pulled my blanket over him. Asleep in no time.

I gingerly got up, slipped the cushions off the couch and onto the floor so I could at least stretch my legs out. Pulled the spare blanket off the armrest and over my chest. Lay awake thinking a great many things, none of which need repeating here.

  



	2. Chop or stack

I woke up hurting, like I was all bones on the ground. Stood up to the crackle of joints, put the couch back together. Cor was still fast asleep, half on his stomach with a pillow tucked under his cheek. Hard not to stare at his bare back visible over the top of the quilt; how each muscle was defined under his skin. He was lean, strong, quite gloriously freckled across his shoulders… _Walk away, Nyx, walk away..._

I tiptoed into my clothes while water boiled; shut off the gas just before it started roiling, hoping that would spare some of the noise. Poured milk and instant coffee into a thermos; added the water. Scrawled a note onto a scrap of paper - “Out for a bit, back soon” - and left it on the table under a clean mug. Snuck out through the front door. It takes forever to catch a latch when you’re trying for silence - the slow-motion close, keeping the bolt of the lock from grinding against strike-plate until door meets jamb and you can let go of the handle. How had I never noticed how much these bastard hinges squeak until now. 

Yeah, I peeked through the window over the bed to make sure he hadn’t woken. The planes of his face were soft with sleep. His fingers were long, curled slightly, prone on the mattress next to him...

How is this turning into one big snowball of confessions?

~

So I took a walk ‘cause evidently I needed to clear my mind. And I had to piss. And it was also my job. Maybe that’s a backward hierarchy of need, I don’t know. There was a man in my bed and all I knew about him was he had a three letter name, same as me. 

Fresh air was good. It was always good out here. Filled my lungs with it while I strode out, after holding my breath to keep quiet all morning. Could have used a shower. Couldn’t trip the pump though. Still, I had coffee and a clear sky. Tipped the thermos upside down to mix it; looked up through the trees. Struck out along a path barely discernible unless you needed it. Early Fall leaves were blotting it out already, but I knew this route well enough. Couple of miles round trip to check the forest for signs of people. They wouldn’t be trespassing, technically, _technically_ , but it was still best for them not to be here. So far, in the two years I’d held this position, I’d met one person one time. That kind of frequency suited me fine.

The metal lip of the thermos was rudely hot, but I knew to expect it. Steam spun around in the mouth of it, lost to the morning the moment it rose any further. Coffee always smelled so good. Even instant. Maybe it smelled better than it tasted, and maybe that’s what I liked most about it: the idea of coffee; the promise. The concept of a morning started _correctly_. Maybe I wasn’t drinking the right coffee though. 

Usually this would be a routine that stilled my mind; something wholly of the body, one step then another, all senses connected to the same moment: just me and the trees above, the ground below, the rustle of leaves in wind all around. Bird call reminding me I wasn’t the only thing alive. The weather whatever it was each day, the hour whenever I decided to set out. I liked mornings, I thought, on each morning I made the round. But then I’d head out of an afternoon and like those too. Sometimes - often times, I guess, and it was kind of the entire point of being out here - I didn’t _anything_ any aspect of it. Just existed somewhere between dawn and dusk. Routine without agenda. 

Ten years ago I wouldn’t have understood what a blessing that was; four years ago I’d dared not have considered it a possibility. It’s that danger in _hoping_ thing again; that crash that comes right after a daydream. I don’t know. Idealism isn’t the same as seeking the bright spots in reality. I’ve done plenty of the latter, I hope; been plenty tempted by the former. Been witness to plenty of ways the former fails, and the latter feeds.

Don’t listen to my garbage. I was just trying to take a walk but my mind was looping in on itself, agitated by its conflicting processes: _Try not to think about the man in your bed_ , it was saying, right alongside some other jerk me chanting _O gods, please think about him, please think about how he’s going to wake up and find you gone and he’ll think about you for your absence and then he’ll put your shirt back on_... It’s corrosive to measure time in terms of absences, but I was doing it then. 

How long had I slept in that bed alone? 

Not that I was expecting that to change… Like coffee, there was a nice _idea_ in all of it. The smell such a promise, such a temptation. _Just keep walking, Nyx…_

I started counting birds to shut my mind up. Didn’t come to the middle of nowhere to think about people.

~

He was up when I got back. I found him sitting on the fallen log out the side of the cottage, staring into the woods, sipping from the mug I’d left on the table. Good man, Cor; feel comfortable. He heard me coming and stood to turn, rolling his shoulders back as he did. Not an exaggerated move - just straightening up properly, getting his muscles into line. 

“You need breakfast?” I asked, headed for the cabin. “I do.” He nodded and followed me inside. 

He’d washed the dishes. Dried them. Put them away. Wiped the bench down. He’d also made the bed, folded the spare quilt on the couch and opened the windows for air. _Wow,_ I couldn’t help but think. _I’ve not made my bed that well in years._ He’d already passed me and was in the kitchen first, setting his mug in the sink, which is where he stood when he shrugged off my thanks.

“Bread and jam?” he asked. Was he about to make me breakfast in my own house?

“Variety just complicates things, don’t you think?”

And there it was, for a whisper of a second: a proper smile, just before he turned to take a knife from the top drawer and the board to cut bread on. He’d paid attention. I thought about what this would be like for him to think back on, once he’d gone: me, the man he ultimately spent less than twenty-four hours with, during which time he'd had two meals, both of which were bread and jam, with a single nights’ sleep between someone else’s sheets separating them. But then, what would I think of him once we’d filled his tank and pointed him back toward the city he was so very far away from… 

My mind went to him wiping down my mismatched crockery with a tatty teatowel, opening cupboard doors until he found the right shelf to add the plates to. If our logic aligned, it’d be the first cupboard he looked in… I’d never know.

“I was thinking,” he said, while he spread jam thick across butter, “if there’s anything that needs doing here, I could help. For a few hours, before we set out. As thanks.”

“Well,” and I'd be damned if I wasn’t going to figure out some job to offer him right now, “this time of year there is always wood to chop.”

“Okay.”

Looks like I’d get to keep him another little while.

~

“You wanna chop or stack?”

He wanted to chop. OK, city boy. Something told me he'd be just fine with an axe. We were standing out by the pile of logs I’d spent the summer dragging here. Huge rounds from fallen limbs, various sizes. I’d haul them back with me from the regular walk, wait until there were enough to cut into lengths during one noisy day with a petrol-powered chainsaw. The noise was revolting in a setting like this: the fumes, the perpetual rotation of teeth on the chain, angry and violent. I’d had enough of the sounds of destruction and couldn’t bear to use the thing a second longer than was necessary.

His muscles rolled under my shirt as he lifted the axe up and everything in my mind stopped when it reached its apex. Then he guided the axe through gravity, working with it, just letting that blade come down precisely where he wanted it, driving itself through each log with the bright smack of dry wood splitting. Heck, this man could use a tool. There was no rush; no fight. Just him and this metal wedge tracing arcs through the air. He tuned his process with every swing until each was identical and frighteningly effective.

I set to picking up the split bits from around him, stacking a wheelbarrow, then rolling off to the woodshed. Coming back to orbit his action again. Sweat began to glisten on his brow, but he was clearly used to - at home in - physical work. He was settled into this, as though each strike could bring him closer to understanding the world. An accumulation of enlightenment by splinters. 

The sun peaked. Began to drop again. Colour changed from clear to golden. He and I eyed each other when it was unmistakably getting too late to set out for town, but neither of us said anything. Neither of us mentioned it. Just chopped and stacked until we were both tired and smelly and committed to another night together. 

“Let’s make dinner,” I finally said, and he landed the axe gently in the top of the chopping block where it stuck perfect, waiting to resume. “You got a place here as long as there’s a pile of wood needs cutting,” I laughed, and I tried to make it sound like it was no big deal, despite meaning every word. I heard him mumble something I couldn’t quite catch, but don’t think it was meant for me to hear anyway.

We peeled vegetables. Potato, carrot, onion, beetroot. Stuff that keeps in a dark place. Cut it all into rough chunks and coated each with oil, stuck into one big heavy baking dish with garlic and dried herbs, then left it in the oven for a couple of hours. Then showers for both of us, and he came out wearing yet another of my shirts and a pair of sweatpants that were a little too short in the leg, and I loved that this was suddenly part of my life - some good-looking old guy freeballing in my home-clothes - so it wasn't without a little sacrifice of desire that I suggested we tackle his laundry, and O my heart, he chuckled, and this was it: the moment I knew I had a big stupid crush on the guy. 

With all the power of retrospect, I was clearly appreciating him from the start, but this - this chuckle in the dim lights of my cabin, with his hair freshly tousled by a towel and the way he hung his head into the truth of the suggestion - was the moment I knew it in real-time. _Should’ve walked away, Nyx,_ I heard my conscience chiding. Yeah, but it’s my house; I couldn’t. 

And here we were.

~

The cabin had come with a twin-tub. Barely a step above hand washing. One drum that churned and another than spun, and you have to haul the wet clothes from one to the other over a partition in the middle. While the cabin filled with roast vegetable smells, we sloshed water about by flashlight out the back - plumbing shared with the shower, through the wall - and eventually bought a basketful of clothes indoors to drape about. Now it was his turn to have his knickers on the back of a chair, and I liked him even more for how little he cared about it.

“Will you go back?” I asked, because I wanted him to say no. Even if he didn’t stay here - as if he would, even if he could - I wanted this to be a break point for him. He’d said he'd started driving and had no reason to stop, and each hour that went by - long after he knew his absence would be noticed - he realised how little consequence there would be. The world adjusts to fill a vacuum; whatever void he created in the city would be absorbed in short time. That’s just what cities are like. Relevance proportional to how much space you take up. 

“I have to.”

“How come?”

“It’s my place.”

“Why did you leave?”

“Maybe so I knew I could.”

There wasn’t anywhere further to go with it, but it sat in the air for a while longer. Cor was thinking, but unreadable. Did he want to go back? Did he want something different? Did he know what he wanted at all…?

He beat me to the couch that night. I’d been conspired against. I threw him a pillow, let him know it’d be a teensy bit more tolerable if he took the cushions to the floor, then rolled into bed. Ah, gosh, it had been one night but I missed this bed all the same. There was a lot of doing without in a place like this, and most of it didn’t matter at all - just made life simpler - but fresh bread and a good mattress were not on my list of compromises.

~

Not surprisingly, given how hard that floor is and how inadequate the cushions, Cor was up before I was. He’d found the little cache of books left behind by previous occupants - a scant selection that seemed to indicate a very bored wife whose romantic life needed subsidising with literature - and had bought one back to the couch with him. He hadn’t realised I was watching him turn pages, his eyebrows raised in what could have been quizzical curiosity or fascinated horror. He was a man of few expressions, but at least there was _something_ readable on his face right now, when he thought he was alone in the moment. The front cover of the book was a couple, strategically draped in fabric, looking _wistful_ and _hungry_ through a vaseline lense. Seeing it in Cor’s hands was a very specific kind of glorious I was thoroughly enjoying.

“Has her bosom heaved delightedly, anxiously, delicately or wantonly?” I asked, as a way to announce my attention as much as anything. 

Cor looked over at me, nestled into blankets as I was, before turning his attention back to the book. “Definitely two of those, and also-” and he flicked backward a few pages, “‘swelled upward in the confines of her bustier, threatening to betray the violent palpitations of her heart that took her each time he walked past her desk.’ Sounds painful.” He looked up at me again, clearly amused, before leaving the book behind while he went to boil water. I wondered whether, if I stayed put, this could end with my getting coffee in bed… 

“Bread and jam?” he asked, and reached for the knife drawer. 

“Nah,” I said, and swung my legs out from the blanket to get up and meet him in the kitchen. “I’ll make you pancakes.” I dared to give a little squeeze to his arm in passing.

“My bosom heaves with anticipation.”

I was too shocked even to laugh - just stood there with my mouth open - and Cor rippled a chuckle through the air that made everything in the world feel right. Then I _did_ laugh, because Cor chuckles at his own jokes, and it was the best human discovery anyone has made in the last century at least, and I was there to make it.

Neither of us mentioned leaving to get fuel. Instead he said he could chop wood again, and I said I needed to take my walk, and that I’d be back before lunch, and that we could look forward to tinned soup and the last of the bread, which meant the afternoon would have to be spent baking.

“Am I eating you out of your home?” he asked, and I said yes, we were going to clean out the pantry twice as fast as I’d do on my own, but it wasn’t a problem. We’d just need to make a trip to town for more food a little earlier than usual. He nodded. 

Neither one of us mentioned how many times I’d just said “we”. Neither one of us mentioned getting fuel, either. 

He was silent the rest of the meal. Then took our dishes into the sink before walking out into the first Fall morning to have some chill in the air - a little nip at the ears - and picked up the axe and started swinging. I made my thermos of coffee, then set out down the track, listening to the thunk of each sharp hit recede into the distance. Got through my checks slowly, knowing full well I was stalling for time. Postponing that moment we’d have to bring up him leaving again and get to planning how that would need to be done. A trip to town for food meant we’d fill up a fuel can and bring it back. He could drive away any time after that...

~

I got back in a bad mood. Not projected anywhere; just settled into my bones. I hoped like heck I could keep it to myself, that Cor wouldn’t feel it trailing like wake and double-check his comfort here. 

“I’m gonna bake,” I said, probably too softly, as I passed him leaning on the axe. I felt his eyes follow me inside.

So I took to the cupboards in the kitchen for my heavy bowl and dry yeast and a spoonful of honey to feed it with, and heated some water just a tiny bit to encourage the process. Dissolved the honey in it, sprinkled the yeast on top. Watched the granules float on the surface, ready to come alive. Then I covered it with a clean tea towel and flopped into the couch when the door opened, then closed, and Cor was inside. 

He didn’t come in far, so I looked over the back of the couch to find him standing in the middle of the room, studying his hands. 

“Everything okay?”I asked, and he dropped his hands back to his sides.

“It’s nothing.”

“What kind of nothing?” I was curious more than concerned, very interested in what Cor’s kind of ‘nothing’ could be.

“Blisters,” he said, frowning at his hands again. “It’s been a while since I held a tool.”

“Let me see?” 

He shook his head and mumbled something about everything being fine, and no doubt it would be, but there was a chance I could help make it _better_ , at least. 

“Who’re you trying to impress right now, tough guy?” I said, and leaned over the back of the couch so I could reach out a hand in invitation.

He didn’t move for a couple of seconds. Just stood there looking at me, then shook his head at his own resignation, gave a huff of a smile, then crossed the room to lay his hands in mine. 

And oh, these hands. These hands had been through so much. Faded scars bedded deep, an entire history etched alongside life-lines and fortunes and futures mapped in every crease; bent knuckles working through old breaks, fingers formed to hold tools in a tight grip, soft in the palm now but I could see too clearly how hard these hands had been once; how accustomed to work. Or to war. Cor, who are you…? 

I looked up to see him watching with his steady, unflinching eyes and felt myself freeze, as though caught doing something I shouldn’t be. Maybe that’s the truth - the last thing I looked at were his blisters, and by the way he had me pinned to the spot, I’m guessing it was obvious. I didn’t let my shiver show, but felt it wind along my spine, ready to shake. 

“I have stuff,” I managed. Great work by me, using my big words. Very impressive. “Sit,” I said, while standing myself. “I’ll be back.”

If it was for me, I’d not go to any of this effort. Blisters are blisters are blisters; they hurt, they’re a mess for a while, then they heal. No big deal. Somehow, for someone else’s hands - for Cor’s - the effort felt necessary. Doing it the _proper_ way. So I had a warm, damp cloth and a handful of sticking plasters and a bottle of something and a tube of something else. Set it all out on the table ready. 

“This is really not necessary,” Cor said, and I admitted I knew as much - we were both very obviously used to breaking our skin - but if I was going to burn wood all winter that fit in the hearth through the kindness of someone else’s time, I’d feel bad each evening if I knew I hadn’t looked after the hands that suffered for it. 

It was the truth, over the top as it was, but it was also begging an indulgence and I swear I only got away with it because there was nothing about any of this - of him being here in my house - that wasn’t ridiculous, and we both knew it. Maybe I leaned into it more than he did, but heck, we both _knew_. So I sat beside him and, with one hand in my lap at a time, wiped them clean, trimmed away broken skin, daubed a dilute disinfectant and smoothed over a healing cream, then covered the whole lot neatly with gauze and tape. My own personal masterpiece of being an obvious fool. 

Cor was looking at me with that sharp expression of _knowing_ , and I felt completely transparent, and also felt like I would probably definitely kiss him if I didn’t get up and shrug this off. I gathered the debris off the table and left him there. Lucky there was bread to bake, and he couldn’t help because his hands were taped up, so I got the kitchen and he got the couch and he lounged with the godsawful romance book while I pushed dough around.

~

He groaned when he got up off the floor next morning. Stiff everywhere. Maybe this is what would push him to leave, I thought, and with nothing more to lose in the face of that scenario, opened my big mouth and said he could always share the bed with me. 

He barely reacted. Waved the statement away while he hobbled off to the bathroom. He came out with water on his face, splashed in an attempt to wake up. 

“What do you need done today?” he asked, and my heart did a little dance while my head gave a lecture on staying cool. “Chopping?”

“You don’t have to,” I said, though I didn’t have any other ideas. “It’s okay to do nothing, you know.”

He sat heavy in a chair while I put a mug into his hands, and was still there when I left to take my walk. It wasn’t as hard this time. I collected a pocket full of rocks to fling into the river further on - liked feeling them drag one side of my jacket down, hearing them clack against each other when I dropped another in. 

The river had something of a bridge across it - a makeshift structure, planks of wood strapped together - that lasted far longer than it should have, and here it was, still going. It flexed under each step and wobbled on the diagonal, but all of this was familiar by now. I sat in the middle with my pocket of rocks, taking out one at a time to send airborne until the water surface gave way to swallow each with a soft and round ker-thop, cradling each rock down to the riverbed gently. If only all burdens were this easy to choose and to let go again.

I’d kind of settled down with the inevitability of Cor leaving, and the subsequent inevitability that I’d be fine, plagued as I would be with all the _what if_ and _why didn’t I _that would last as long as the _remembering_ was fresh. I might not’ve learned a lot in life, but I did know time would force a moving on. It’ll move us on from anything, whether we wanted it to or not… An idiot with a crush would be erased fast enough once days turned to months turned to years. __

__These were the thoughts I was kicking around when I came back to the clearing at the cottage, right in time to catch Cor - a sheen of sweat on his brow - with both hands on the hem of his shirt. We met eyes just as he lifted, and suddenly he was shirtless in the sunshine, and goodbye all my decency and willpower; I could not look away. Welcome home, me._ _

__“Gods, Cor, warn a guy,” I muttered, and he smiled, and hoisted the wheelbarrow filled with wood to roll off and add to the growing stack, and whatever resolve I thought I had about being fine with him leaving and being fine with forgetting were shunted rudely from my mind. Rudely and wonderfully. What was I supposed to do now?_ _

__Evening brought the cold with it. It would roll down the valley with the river, a mass of chilled air, and tonight it made it to the cabin early. We decided to light the first fire of the season, and bought a few fresh-cut logs indoors. Crumpled old newspaper first; added smaller twigs. Gently laid a few bigger bits on the top. Cor lit the match and held it to paper, and we both sat there at the hearth watching the flame take, curling the edges of the newsprint and licking between the twigs until they got a good enough taste to take hold in earnest. The stack collapsed a couple of times as each layer was consumed, leaving the larger pieces alone in the glowing coals, burning slow and hot._ _

__We pulled the couch nearer and slumped in it low, stretching our feet toward the flames to let toes get too hot through two matching pairs of my thick socks… I would never get tired of seeing Cor in my clothes._ _

__“I have marshmallows,” I said, twisting sideways on the couch to see Cor’s reaction. He had his eyes closed and his hands draped over his belly. His teeth caught the light as he smiled._ _

__“You toast marshmallows indoors?”_ _

__“Please keep my filthy secret.”_ _

__His smile grew. “We haven’t had dinner yet,” was all he said back._ _

__“All we have left to eat in this entire house are a couple of tins of baked beans.” Listen to all of this _we_ we’re both saying._ _

__He cracked an eyelid and looked at me sideways. “Better get them over and done with first.”_ _

__He was stirring beans in a saucepan at the stove when he finally brought up what we’d both avoided until now._ _

__“Guess this means we’ll have to go to town tomorrow.” Just like that._ _

__“Yeah, we will.” I took two bowls from the cupboard. I only owned three._ _

__“And get fuel.” He turned off the gas._ _

__“That too.” Spoons or forks? I didn’t know. Spoons. Owned three of those, too. Two too many, most days. What are these thoughts for, anyway._ _

__“Thank you, Nyx. For everything.” I looked up from where I was moping in the top drawer and was pinned again by a gaze strong enough to feel deep beneath my skin._ _

__“It’s no trouble.” It was a mumble. _You leaving is, though.__ _

__After my bowl of morose beans, we really did take a bag of marshmallows to the couch, impaling them on long sticks and turning them over the edge of the coals. I watched him in his infinite patience, holding his back further than I held mine, spinning it on its axis until it was uniformly, perfectly golden. Meanwhile, I was always in a race to turn mine faster than it would droop, threatening all the while to relinquish hold of the stick to pat into the coals and burn into the ash in black and acrid bubbles. Thankfully, this time, I managed to keep control of every impending catastrophe, though damn my mind for seeing all of this as some fucking metaphor for life and character._ _

__Cor once again slept on the cushions on the floor._ _

____

~

Some time in the night he woke me up. I was disorientated by the hour and took a while to realise he was softly calling my name in the dark, hovering over the edge of the bed. _Nyx,_ he was saying, _I’m sorry to wake you._ And me, with all my relentless charms, managed a sound that was barely formed using recognisable letters, while I pulled myself from sleep to this impossibly wonderful moment in which Cor was explaining how the fire had gone out and he was cold and miserable and every part of him hurt and he needed a proper mattress and warm blankets, and therefore to share the bed. So I shuffled over between the sheets so he could have my warm spot, which he slid into tense with the chill in his bones and the burden of causing disturbance. In settling down, his icicle fingers brushed my arm, so I wrapped them tight in my hands to help warm them up, and within moments I’d fallen asleep again.


	3. Jam first

When morning came, all of the night before pooled in my consciousness before I opened my eyes. When I did peek, Cor was already awake, propped on an elbow. Watching me. 

“Morning,” I managed, and rubbed my face in my pillow, hoping time had stopped, that the world outside the window had ended, that there was absolutely nothing out there to interrupt this single point of perfection my bed had become. _You’re real nice to wake up to, Cor,_ I thought. And maybe I’ll blame the fog of sleep, ‘cause I said it out loud right after.

“You’re real nice to wake up to.”

He didn’t respond. Not for a while, at least, and when he did, it wasn’t with words. He brushed a finger across my cheek to smooth hair behind my ear, and followed one of my braids down the side of my neck, and I was still catching up to all of it - still convincing myself this was real - when his lips met my shoulder, bare above the blanket, and left a kiss there. I opened my eyes. 

“Are we really doing this?” I asked, but was already reaching for his hips, ready to pull myself closer to him, to feel his skin on mine. He answered with a hand spread wide across my cheek, fingers slipping to the back of my neck, firm and definitive and wanting. Gods help, we were really doing this. 

He kissed soft and small; a brush of lip, a light press. He’d leave my mouth to kiss along my jaw and my neck and _ah,_ just behind my ear, and he’d pull himself in there, just breathing, nuzzling, bedding in… And our bodies came together in all the same ways: soft, a brush, a press. Testing each other out, getting our alignment right. 

And when we got there - when we came together easy, and our bodies rolled into each other, and our breath came broken by pleasure and there were teeth in our kisses and nails in our skin - it became clear I hadn’t been keeping up, ‘cause he took my hand from where I’d been orbiting around hip bones and bellies and the waistband of his underpants - just, you know, _being there_ \- and he moved it lower and lined it up and pressed it full and hard against the fabric stretched taut over the bulge of his cock, and wow, I could have lost it there. I could have ended early. Could have given over to all the friction that was too easy to find and come all up and down the both of us. It had been a while. But I kept myself together somehow; laid him bare. Got to know him that much better…

We lost hours like this.

~

Eventually we washed the messy morning off in the shower, spreading lather across each others’ backs for the sake of continuing to touch, rubbing ourselves into each other somehow. Trying to draw this out. I buried myself between his shoulder blades while he made us late coffee and - just for something different - toasted the bread. Me, the man who lived alone, reluctant to break contact even for a second. I didn’t want to unwrap my arms from his waist long enough to feed myself.

And as much as I’d love to have carelessly overlooked the time, we ended up needing to bundle into the car in a hurry to make it to the store before close. It was a good few hours of driving - two and a half on a road that had more than its share of narrow-lane curves as it wound round the side of the range. Often a drop on one side, a steep slope up on the other. 

We had an empty petrol tin in the back and to taunt me through the whole ride it’d clang against the side of the car with each change in direction. _Empty and poorly secured_ , I thought. Pathetic metaphors for life again. Why did _everything_ seem meaningful when your heart was tangled up on someone else? 

I didn’t miss this part of the process. It was... tiring.

Cor spent most of the trip looking out the window. There was plenty to see - forest hemming us in right up to the verge; the distant glimpse of tall peaks that kept a snowcap year round; streams and rivers in every little valley; it was nice. I had to remind myself to focus on the road. Was desperate to reach across the console and rest a hand on his thigh. Maybe I could borrow some of his calm. I was an agitated mess; thank fuck for manual transmission and plenty of reason to shift gears, ‘cause my legs were restless and my mind a storm, and then part of me was just… _hungry_ for him. I wanted to pull over and tumble into his lap, to tear that old shirt of mine off his body, recline the seat, find a way to make each pass of his wandering hand an indelible trace on my memory. I don’t know, I just… I wanted him.

We got the fuel first to get it out of the way. Filled my tank; filled the tin. Wiped the windows down. Maybe I looked as dark as I felt about this, ‘cause Cor took his attention from the window and put it on me: heavy, studious, as characteristically unreadable as he’d been from day one. In this, we really couldn’t have been more different: me, so emotionally obvious.

It was a short scowl down the one main street of town to get to the tiny supermarket. I did my usual round to stock up a memorised pantry; lost Cor for part of it. He returned to add his own bundle to the cart, along with two bottles of local wine and a multipack of supermarket underpants. A drink for our last meal and clean undies for the road I guess. _It’s alright, Nyx. You can do this._ And I could. But I really didn’t want to.

It wasn’t by design we took the toiletries aisle back to the checkout, but Cor stopped us in it, took a few steps backward. Held my eyes when he toppled a packet of prophylactics off the shelf and into the cart. If he was hoping for a reaction, he got what he wanted: I couldn’t hide my surprise and really didn’t know where to look, and giggled with the shock of it and fell silent again for the disbelief. What a way to learn he could be this bold, thinking ahead much further than I was. If he was after some reassurance, having me toss a bottle of lubricant in with his wine and my tinned vegetables would have to do.

Cor paid, and I let him, ‘cause I knew there were few other ways to offer tangible gratitude. He ate three days worth of food and paid for two weeks of it on a shiny Crown City card.

~

We got home after dark, though the dark was coming noticeably earlier now. Brought everything inside in a few trips; I made my usual stacks of things in the pantry and filled the fridge with the few luxury perishables a trip to town bought with it. Cor busied himself in the kitchen, and was still going when all my stuff was done.

“Can I help?” I asked, feeling useless in my own home.

He turned at the hip and unexpectedly wrapped an arm around my back, pulling me into his chest, dipping to brush lips against my ear. I melted against him in an instant. “You can light the fire,” he said, and kissed me before letting go again. 

I stumbled out a feeble “Okay” that sounded every bit as weak as my knees felt, then left to build a fire in last night’s ashes. Flames were just starting to take hold when Cor brought food to the coffee table - a lot of things cut up into small bits that could be stacked on top of crackers. Wine food. He’d found the local produce section and bought all the cheese and fruit, and laid out a feast of it on my old wooden chopping board. Making anything _fancy_ from the selection in a nowhere-town store was a rare skill. I was struck again by how little I knew this guy, here on my knees on the rug by the hearth, looking up at him while he poured good wine into cheap glasses… Maybe I looked as lost as I felt here, ‘cause he twitched a smile at the corner of his lip, tilted his head in place of a shrug to bring the moment down.

“It’s not much,” he said. Lying.

“It’s a lot, Cor.” 

“Just nibbles.”

“You have nibbles for dinner?” 

“One filthy secret in exchange for another.” He paid too much attention and was using my own words against me. And they worked. I was disarmed. Crawled across the floor and into the couch; let him hand me a glass and clink his to the edge of it. A toast to something. Who knows what. I decided I didn’t want to know what he was paying tribute to right now; his full tank of gas, his ticket out of here. New underpants. Fancy food in a rough as shit cabin. A good fuck before he left. There was safety in believing all these thoughts, but they were false and poisonous, and I hated them. _To knowing what you lose,_ I thought, and took a sip, and the wine was good and rich and warm on my tongue, and I tilted sideways to lean on Cor when he sat down, and him leaning back was an instant antidote to my sad and sour mind.

We talked and nibbled and didn’t look at the clock. Kept the fire going, curled our toes together. Held hands when the food was gone and the wine was in our veins just enough to tip the conversation from talk to touching. It was another slow start - breath on necks and lips hovering - savouring the claustrophobia that came from existing entirely in the feel of someone else’s body. 

He was strong as hell. I’d never been lifted into someone’s lap before, but he made it easy. Put me on him where it felt good, let me know I was wanted there. I stripped him of his shirt; felt him hard in the crook of my thighs. The bulge of him pressed against the bulge of me. The fire was warm on my naked back; Cor’s hands cool as they smoothed across it, squeezed my butt, made me gasp. _Heck,_ I thought… but that’s as far as thoughts went now. A litany of swear words and silent exclamations as he unbuttoned and unzipped and took me in his hand and _held me_. Then I was completely naked, and he was completely naked, and I had to get up to find the lubrication so he could slick everything up, and I sat there on him with his hand trapped between my arse and my balls and his legs, felt the way his kissing changed when he slid a finger in and his focus in the moment split. 

Then we were forehead to forehead, mixing sweat, our cocks aching and neglected in the small space between us. We pulled apart for as long as it took to rip a packet open with teeth and roll latex down Cor’s shaft. Then it was all up to me: more lubrication, a new angle. Cor’s face held in my hands so I could watch him as he felt this happen, see his eyelids flutter and his mouth fall open, get my tongue between his teeth as he tried to grit them against the pleasure that pulsed hot and hard in him, and now in me. I could feel it in the tension of his arms, the tilt of his hips. He was holding back from letting go. I sunk all the way, gasped his name, gave myself to the juncture of his shoulder… 

I learned, through sex-fogged blinks, that Cor kept his eyes open. That he watched. That he trailed hands across my body for the thrill of seeing himself touch. He was soundless but for an occasional growl, when he’d arch his back at the precipice, dig thumbs into my flesh, bite at my neck. I’d feel his thighs tremble when I came down, knew I had to fight my own drive to keep a rhythm if we were going to make this last. I’d kiss him for distraction; run fingers through his hair. Grind slowly with him all in; not enough for friction. His grip would soften and his tremble stop, and he’d kiss back with his pale eyes fogged through lashes, tangling my braids between his fingers, pushing them behind my ears. 

And we made it to that moment neither of us could stop short of any more, when we were broken down by the accumulation, at the mercy of the crest which swelled and rose and tipped us over. He tumbled into my chest, holding me still while he burst, lifting both of us off the couch while his hips rose with the surge of it. When he slumped back he looked at me - just _looked_ at me - and wrapped my dick his his fist. It didn’t take much.

When I found my breath, and my voice with it, and I picked myself up from where I’d fallen against him, all I could think to say was _Stay._

“Stay,” and the word broke in my throat, and I felt him slip where he softened in my arse, and he rumbled something in his chest I couldn’t understand. At least in silence there’s some pity for everything that would crumble if he’d said _no_.

~

He jumped awake in the morning, shook the bed, swore, woke me up too. 

“What’s up?” I asked, worried and confused and disoriented, my heart hammering fast in my chest. I followed his line of sight to the window above the bed, where the double-helix horn and angular, dark face of a spiracorn peered in at us, cheek pressed against the glass to get a better eyeful. I laughed in relief and dragged Cor back down to the pillows, draped myself over him. “That’s the bastard who ate my underpants,” I explained. 

He peered up at the nostrils flaring fog onto the glass, then brought his attention back to me. “I thought you were joking.”

“I fed him my bread crusts _one time_ , and now he won’t leave me alone.”

Cor was silent a while. I could feel him relaxing in the wrap of my sleep-heavy arms, hear his heart beat slow with my ear to his skin. “I ate your bread crusts and I haven’t left you alone, either.” His chuckle resonated from deep in his chest. Laughing at his own jokes again. This one didn’t feel so funny to me, now that he had a means to leave. 

Outside, the spiracorn was tromping around on the porch, each hoof-strike on wood reverberating through the cabin. He was too big to be under a roof and knocked into everything. A one beast cacophony. Both of us studiously ignored him until he eventually stepped out onto dirt and took off back to the wilds that owned him. The silence he left behind was deafening.

“How far do we have to go to get phone reception?” Cor asked. My body tensed. There was a _we_ in here and I wasn’t sure how to take it. An ember of hope flared up. I tamped it out.

“I can boost your signal here.” 

“How?”

“We’ll have to take a walk.”

“I can get a message through to Insomnia?”

“To anywhere, yeah.” 

He trailed fingertips aimlessly across my back, inattentive and lost in thought. Then he stopped, and he took a breath, and I rose and fell on his chest with it, anxious for what came next. 

“I want to stay,” he said, and I’m pretty sure we both stopped breathing. 

“...Yeah?” I propped myself up on an elbow. He was staring at the ceiling. This was a much bigger decision for him than it was for me, and the imbalance hit in a wave of guilt. All I had to do was stand still while this good looking mystery rearranged his entire life to line it up with mine.

“We can send a message after breakfast.” He rolled us over.

“Okay.” I was still catching up.

“Toast and jam.” He kissed his way down my body, across nipples, over my belly, pulling the sheets off both of us as he went.

“Okay.” It was a gasp more than it was a word. 

“Jam first.” He met my swell with an open mouth. 

His sense of humour was going to destroy me.

~

“We’ll need this,” I said, rummaging around in the tool cabinet. It was out next to the washing machine. A glamorous life, out here. I handed Cor a pry bar. “And we’ll need this,” I added, pulling a cable out of a box and passing it back to him, too. “And this,” finally, sliding a portable battery off the bottom shelf. It was heavy, but at least had a handle. Cor was puzzled but didn’t say anything, and I didn’t know how to start explaining it - seeing would be simpler. 

We walked along my usual track, soon swallowed by a forest turning golden and red all around us. Leaves fell every time the breeze picked up, adding themselves to the accumulation that bundled against trunks and blotted the path. Cor trailed behind, slowed by the scenery. I didn’t rush and didn’t interrupt - just wondered what it was like to be him right now, having made a decision to stay. For a while, at least. Whether that coloured his view of the place. Made him tread differently, knowing he was no longer passing through. I looked back at him in my checkered shirt, staring up through the canopy to the blue sky, and turned back to the path to hide my sheepish smile. Swapped the battery to the other hand.

Then I heard him stop in his tracks, abrupt. So, he’d seen the first of _them_. I turned to face him. 

He didn’t say anything for a long while, and when he did, it wasn’t what I expected. “Whose side were you on?”

I knew he was a soldier from that first day, by the military grade corners he made the bed with. Now he guessed I’d been one, too. “I’m Galahdian - what choice did I have?” It wasn’t the kindest answer, but it was the most honest. I’d fought with a knife on the front lines for Insomnia, but I could understand why he was confused right now. 

He looked from me back to the machine, crumpled in on itself against a tree trunk, a haphazard collapse of metal limbs around a chassis, rust rivulets streaking down each surface from years spent in the weather. Nature hadn’t done much to reclaim it yet beyond working itself beneath the paint, but Fall had given a layer of leaves, and between the shafts and hydraulics of its frame a few vines had twisted upward in fine green coils. It was sad, in its way - it the onset of decay - to be discarded the second there was no further use. War machines were only worth something when there was a war. I felt a pang of sympathy.

“And who signs your paycheck now?” he asked. Rightfully. These were from Niflheim, and I can only imagine what the Insomnia he’d driven out of had become under occupation. I’d left as early as I could; it wasn’t my city. It was where the food and shelter was. That’s what I fought for. And for lack of a better alternative.

“Lucis, still. Indirectly.” He hadn’t moved from his spot - just stood there cautious but patient while I chose my words. I explained about the machine graveyard - how it had been a secret launch site during the war, but had been abandoned when Niflheim won - and how the machines had been deactivated and stripped of weapons but not destroyed. How I’d fought well enough to prove some loyalty, but hadn’t become a person of interest. I’d been hired technically as summer firewatch, spending a lot of time in a tower, but that I was really here to make sure the old mech kept mouldering in a forest of war husks. And I explained how there were enough reappointed Lucians in token roles through environmental management and the fucking Peace Force to keep a network of information flowing. I was a link in a chain of people who _watched_ , and who didn’t draw attention from occupiers.

He blinked a few times, and dragged a hand down his face. “I didn’t know about this place.”

“Should you have?” His car told me he was someone. Maybe I was about to find out who.

But he shook his head. No, he shouldn’t have known. “I was-” and I saw him sidestep something in his mind- “high up. Surveillance was delegated below me.” He came to stand by my side. “It’s hard to face how much I was blind to.”

I had no idea what to say to address the weight of the mood. This isn’t somewhere I wanted to make assumptions. We’d both ended up at the feet of the machine, standing shoulder to shoulder, looking up at the hulk of it, impossibly still. The breeze picked up, carried my hair over my shoulder, sent a shiver down my spine. It never stopped being spooky.

“How many are there?” he asked. A welcome change in direction.

“Dozens. A few airships too.” I stepped out onto the path again. “The one we’re after is a bit further on.”

Once you’d seen one, you’d see them everywhere. Mounds of collapsed metal in the woods. Some were still upright - standing tall on frozen armature, their vacant cockpits reflecting the flutter of the dwindling canopy. Others had toppled face-first and were prone in the dirt, looking as though they were slowly sinking into it, fallen branches propped at whatever angle they’d fought gravity for. One had mushrooms between each of its toes; another had grass growing long in its joints. Overlaid on all of this were the nightmares in my own mind: the shriek and grind of a battlefield; the percussive throb of air; the metal, the fire, the flesh, the screams, the blood. These _things_ at the centre of it mowing us down, mocking us with their two legs and two arms just like we had. 

I left the path again a short while later, stopping at another slumped machine. “This is the one.” It wasn’t the biggest, but it had an intact antenna that would still extend and retract. I took the pry bar from Cor and wedged it into the seam of the cockpit. There was a release lever, but it was stuck for lack of use and needed the extra persuasion. But once that initial force transferred, the hatch went up easy enough on slow hydraulics. 

I plugged in the battery and the console lit up in patches where the circuits still connected. With a couple of flicks I had the antenna rising upward through the lower branches of the trees; with another I’d scrambled any signal so nobody could trace the origin back to us. These machines were not supposed to turn on any more; we had lazy decommissioners to thank for this one. And maybe I soldered a few spots to help it along. 

“You plug in here.” I pointed at a jack down the side of the console. Cor figured out the rest. The cable he’d carried converted Niflheim ports to Lucian; his phone charger fit right into that. We watched the signal bars appear out of nowhere. 

I turned my back while he typed. Didn’t know who he was sending to. Didn’t know what he was saying. A few minutes later, he wrapped arms around my waist and pulled me against him. 

“It’s done,” he said. I turned in his arms to face him. 

“There’s a little while before you’ll be snowed in with me for the winter.” It was my way of saying he still had time to leave. Maybe I needed to hear it too, now that we’d _done_ this, inviting all the inevitable but unknown consequence. He nodded. 

“What do you do out here?”

“I think about things. Think about nothing. Fish a bit. Hike the ridge when the weather’s good. Throw rocks at water.”

He laughed.

We retracted the antenna again, unplugged the battery. Slammed the hatch shut a few times until it latched. 

“Just for something different, how do you feel about chopping some wood?” I asked, with a wink for good measure. 

“Yeah. Okay.” 

_Until we get snowed in._ It was _us,_ on trial, and that was feeling pretty _big_ all of a sudden. Not cold feet, but… well, the quiet life wasn’t for everyone. Maybe it wasn’t even for me, except temporarily. I’d welcomed it as the opposite of war - a reaction more than a choice - and hadn’t thought it through much more than that. I knew it could rub minds the wrong way. Isolation shifts any tangible point of reality. Madness is relative…

Despite all that, I found myself hoping for an early winter. For the snows to come heavy. For the long nights and the late mornings. Hearth and home.

**Author's Note:**

> For my dearest miriya, the Cor to my Nyx, who prompted me a sunset and instead got _this_.
> 
>  
> 
> A little note: if you followed along chapter by chapter, I messed up when I posted chapter 2 and missed 1000 words at the start! Please skip back and take a look - it'll make things come together so much better ❤


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